Crowd-sourced photography award unearths hidden beauty

Morpholio eyetime competition – Javier Corso, Painter of BattlesEyeTime 2013 photography competition invited students, young professionals, and enthusiasts to submit up to three digital images, with the mission to give a voice to a new generation of talent. It was supported by the International Center of Photography, the Art Directors Club, Resource Magazine and American Photographic Artists, and hosted by The Morpholio Project. One of the aims of the competition was to investigate how the proliferation of device culture, social networking, and cloud technology is changing the way individuals create, connect and share their content. Shown above is one of the winning entries by Javier Corso who took the Emerging Talent Public award.

Finalists were selected through an innovative public viewing system called "EyeTime", which recorded the amount and type of views an image received. "EyeTime" data also included hits and information on whether a photo was zoomed on. Additional finalists were selected by the organizers, and the jury comprised of industry experts from Wired Magazine, The International Center of Photography and American Photographic Artists.

Dominican Republic born and U.S.-based photographer Michael Santiago's pictures strive to show the positive side of negative situations that people find themselves in. This poignant photograph of a war veteran made him the Future Voices Jury Winner.

The "In Pieces" series combines the Emerging Talent Jury Winner Dean West's photography with the sculptures of Nathan Sawaya placed within. Using mostly frontal style imagery of the North American landscape, it references the American Picture Postcard.

Emerging Talent Jury Winner Edward Neumann documents London's stunning architecture with a child-like fascination:" Having spent most of my life surrounded by such marvels, it is my attempt at hopefully doing them justice." His work revolves around symmetry and strong lines.

Santiago says:" I want to show what people do to overcome the depression and struggles that come with either battling a disease while you are supposed to be enjoying your twilight years, or finding yourself a veteran without a home and trying to figure out why that is happening."

Another Emerging Talent Jury Winner SImon Chang is a Taiwanese photographer based in Ljubljana, Slovenia. He studied in Prague and his work is deeply influenced by the tradition of classical black and white Czech photography. Chang's work focuses on overlooked people in mainstream society: "I am interested in stories with cultural depth, and the reactions of people to different environments."

Tiberio Ventura, Italian-born, Dublin-based Future Voices Jury Winner gives his attention to social issues he wants to highlight. He says: "I see photography as a way to give voice to people who do not have the chance to speak and talk about their stories."

This series of photographs "Wasted Youth" tackle the dire situation Italy's younger generation find themselves in: "I think at the moment in Italy many young people are struggling to get a job and feel part of society. I undertook this project because I thought it was a story which needed to be told," says Ventura.

Nicholai Go's inspiration for the photo that brought him the Future Voices award was dreams. The Philippine photographer said: "How far can you really travel in your dreams where everything is possible? One thing that connects the dream world and our reality is time. We have a finite amount of time no matter the reality."

Emerging Talent Jury Winner Obsoquasi, a photographer from Zurich, wrote several short stories, and then captured their narrative with his lens. He says: "Each story holds something very personal, sometimes even intimate to the person I photograph, because although the characters are fictional, they are strongly inspired by him or her." The narratives behind the photos were shaped together by Obsoquasi and his models, finding subjects that hold meaning to them and their lives.

Emerging Talent Jessica Lum Award Jury Winner Alessandro Falco often features water in his photographs: " Water amplifies emotions, for this reason it is often a protagonist in my work. This photo is a part of the Amnios series, in which I tried to summarize the origins of such a contrasting as indissoluble relationship."